Babbage's Brilliant Invention
This is part of a trial portion of Babbage's Difference Engine No. 1, which is one of the earliest automatic calculators and a celebrated icon in the pre-history of the computer.
Charles Babbage was a brilliant thinker and mathematician who devised the Difference Engine to automate the production of error-free mathematical tables. In 1823 he secured £1,500 from the British government and employed an engineer to construct the device. However, the project collapsed in 1833 when the engineer left the project.
By that time the government had spent £17,000 on the project, the equivalent then of the cost of two major warships. Recent research has shown that the engineer's work was adequate to create a functioning machine and that the project actually collapsed because of economics, politics, Babbage's temperament and his style of directing the enterprise.
Seen in the Science Museum, London. I think this is a truer colour example than an earlier image that can be seen in my stream from a few years ago.
Babbage's Brilliant Invention
This is part of a trial portion of Babbage's Difference Engine No. 1, which is one of the earliest automatic calculators and a celebrated icon in the pre-history of the computer.
Charles Babbage was a brilliant thinker and mathematician who devised the Difference Engine to automate the production of error-free mathematical tables. In 1823 he secured £1,500 from the British government and employed an engineer to construct the device. However, the project collapsed in 1833 when the engineer left the project.
By that time the government had spent £17,000 on the project, the equivalent then of the cost of two major warships. Recent research has shown that the engineer's work was adequate to create a functioning machine and that the project actually collapsed because of economics, politics, Babbage's temperament and his style of directing the enterprise.
Seen in the Science Museum, London. I think this is a truer colour example than an earlier image that can be seen in my stream from a few years ago.